THE  RELIGION 
OF  THE  FUTURE 

BY 
CHARLES  W.  ELIOT 


BOSTON 

THE  BALL  PUBLISHING  CO. 
1909 


THE  publishers  wish  to  acknowl- 
edge their  obligation  to  the  author 
for  permission  to  publish  in  book  form 
this  lecture,  which  was  first  delivered 
by  President  Eliot  at  the  close  of  the 
Eleventh  Session  of  the  Harvard  Sum- 
mer School  of  Theology. 


THE  RELIGION  OF  THE 
FUTURE 

AS  students  in  this  summer's  School 
of  Theology  you  have  attended 
a  series  of  lectures  on  fluctua- 
tions in  religious  interest,  on  the  frequent 
occurrence  of  religious  declines  followed 
soon  by  recoveries  or  regenerations  both 
within  and  without  the  churches,  on  the 
frequent  attempts  to  bring  the  prevalent 
religious  doctrines  into  harmony  with  new 
tendencies  in  the  intellectual  world,  on  the 
constant  struggle  between  conservatism 
5 


6         RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

and  liberalism  in  existing  churches  and 
between  idealism  and  materialism  in  so- 
ciety at  large,  on  the  effects  of  popular 
education  and  the  modern  spirit  of  inquiry 
on  religious  doctrines  and  organizations, 
on  the  changed  views  of  thinking  people 
concerning  the  nature  of  the  world  and  of 
man,  on  the  increase  of  knowledge  as  af- 
fecting religion,  and  on  the  new  ideas  of 
God.  You  have  also  listened  to  lectures 
on  psychotherapy,  a  new  development  of 
an  ancient  tendency  to  mix  religion  with 
medicine,  and  on  the  theory  of  evolution, 
a  modern  scientific  doctrine  which  within 
fifty  years  has  profoundly  modified  the 
religious  conceptions  and  expectations  of 
many  thinking  people.  You  have  heard, 
too,  how  the  new  ideas  of  democracy  and 
social  progress  have  modified  and  ought 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE         7 

to  modify  not  only  the  actual  work  done 
by  the  churches,  but  the  whole  conception 
of  the  function  of  churches.  Again,  you 
have  heard  how  many  and  how  profound 
are  the  religious  implications  in  contem- 
porary philosophy.  Your  attention  has 
been  called  to  the  most  recent  views  con- 
cerning the  conservation  of  energy  in  the 
universe,  to  the  wonderful  phenomena  of 
radio-activity,  and  to  the  most  recent  def- 
initions of  atom,  molecule,  ion,  and  elec- 
tron— human  imaginings  which  have  much 
to  do  with  the  modern  conceptions  of  mat- 
ter and  spirit.  The  influence  on  popular 
religion  of  modern  scholarship  applied  to 
the  New  Testament  has  also  engaged 
your  attention;  and,  finally,  you  have 
heard  an  exposition  of  religious  condi- 
tions and  practices  in  the  United  States 


8         RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

which  assumed  an  intimate  connection  be- 
tween the  advance  of  civilization  and  the 
contemporaneous  aspects  of  religions,  and 
illustrated  from  history  the  service  of  re- 
ligion— and  particularly  of  Christianity — 
to  the  progress  of  civilization  through  its 
contributions  to  individual  freedom,  intel- 
lectual culture,  and  social  cooperation. 

The  general  impression  you  have  re- 
ceived from  this  comprehensive  survey 
must  surely  be  that  religion  is  not  a  fixed, 
but  a  fluent  thing.  It  is,  therefore,  wholly 
natural  and  to  be  expected  that  the  con- 
ceptions of  religion  prevalent  among  edu- 
cated people  should  change  from  century 
to  century.  Modern  studies  in  compara- 
tive religion  and  in  the  history  of  religions 
demonstrate  that  such  has  been  the  case 
in  times  past.  Now  the  nineteenth  cen- 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE         9 

tury  immeasurably  surpassed  all  preced- 
ing centuries  in  the  increase  of  knowledge, 
and  in  the  spread  of  the  spirit  of  scientific 
inquiry  and  of  the  passion  for  truth-seek- 
ing. Hence  the  changes  in  religious  be- 
liefs and  practices,  and  in  the  relation  of 
churches  to  human  society  as  a  whole, 
were  much  deeper  and  more  extensive  in 
that  century  than  ever  before  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  world;  and  the  approach  made 
to  the  embodiment  in  the  actual  practices 
of  mankind  of  the  doctrines  of  the  great- 
est religious  teachers  was  more  significant 
and  more  rapid  than  ever  before.  The 
religion  of  a  multitude  of  humane  persons 
in  the  twentieth  century  may,  therefore, 
be  called  without  inexcusable  exaggera- 
tion a  "new  religion," — not  that  a  single 
one  of  its  doctrines  and  practices  is  really 


10       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

new  in  essence,  but  only  that  the  wider  ac- 
ceptance and  better  actual  application  of 
truths  familiar  in  the  past  at  many  times 
and  places,  but  never  taken  to  heart  by 
the  multitude  or  put  in  force  on  a  large 
scale,  are  new.  I  shall  attempt  to  state 
without  reserve  and  in  simplest  terms  free 
from  technicalities,  first,  what  the  religion 
of  the  future  seems  likely  not  to  be,  and 
secondly,  what  it  may  reasonably  be  ex- 
pected to  be.  My  point  of  view  is  that 
of  an  American  layman,  whose  observing 
and  thinking  life  has  covered  the  extraor- 
dinary period  since  the  Voyage  of  the 
Beagle  was  published,  anaesthesia  and  the 
telegraph  came  into  use,  Herbert  Spencer 
issued  his  first  series  of  papers  on  evolu- 
tion, Kuenen,  Robertson  Smith,  and  Well- 
hausen  developed  and  vindicated  Biblical 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       11 

criticism,  J.  S.  Mill's  Principles  of  Po- 
litical Economy  appeared,  and  the  United 
States  by  going  to  war  with  Mexico  set 
in  operation  the  forces  which  abolished 
slavery  on  the  American  continent — the 
period  within  which  mechanical  power 
came  to  be  widely  distributed  through  the 
explosive  engine  and  the  applications  of 
electricity,  and  all  the  great  fundamental 
industries  of  civilized  mankind  were  re- 
constructed. 

(1)  The  religion  of  the  future  will  not 
be  based  on  authority,  either  spiritual  or 
temporal.  The  decline  of  reliance  upon 
absolute  authority  is  one  of  the  most  sig- 
nificant phenomena  of  the  modern  world. 
This  decline  is  to  be  seen  everywhere, — 
in  government,  in  education,  in  the  church, 
in  business,  and  in  the  family.  The  pres- 


12       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

ent  generation  is  willing,  and  indeed  often 
eager,  to  be  led;  but  it  is  averse  to  being 
driven,  and  it  wants  to  understand  the 
grounds  and  sanctions  of  authoritative 
decisions.  As  a  rule,  the  Christian 
churches,  Roman,  Greek,  and  Protestant, 
have  heretofore  relied  mainly  upon  the 
principle  of  authority,  the  Reformation 
having  substituted  for  an  authoritative 
church  an  authoritative  book;  but  it  is 
evident  that  the  authority  both  of  the  most 
authoritative  churches  and  of  the  Bible  as 
a  verbally  inspired  guide  is,  already  greatly 
impaired,  and  that  the  tendency  towards 
liberty  is  progressive,  and  among  educated 
men  irresistible. 

(2)  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  say  that 
in  the  religion  of  the  future  there  will  be 
no  personifications  of  the  primitive  forces 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       13 

of  nature,  such  as  light,  fire,  frost,  wind, 
storm,  and  earthquake,  although  primitive 
religions  and  the  actual  religions  of  bar- 
harous  or  semi-civilized  peoples  abound  in 
such  personifications.  The  mountains, 
groves,  volcanoes,  and  oceans  will  no 
longer  be  inhabited  by  either  kindly  or 
malevolent  deities ;  although  man  will  still 
look  to  the  hills  for  rest,  still  find  in  the 
ocean  a  symbol  of  infinity,  and  refresh- 
ment and  delight  in  the  forests  and  the 
streams.  The  love  of  nature  mounts  and 
spreads,  while  faith  in  fairies,  imps, 
nymphs,  demons,  and  angels  declines  and 
fades  away. 

(3)  There  will  be  in  the  religion  of  the 
future  no  worship,  express  or  implied,  of 
dead  ancestors,  teachers  or  rulers ;  no  more 
tribal,  racial,  or  tutelary  gods;  no  identi- 


14       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

fication  of  any  human  being,  however 
majestic  in  character,  with  the  Eternal 
Deity.  In  these  respects  the  religion  of 
the  future  will  not  be  essentially  new,  for 
nineteen  centuries  ago  Jesus  said,  "Neither 
in  this  mountain,  nor  in  Jerusalem,  shall 
ye  worship  the  Father.  .  .  .  God  is 
a  Spirit;  and  they  that  worship  him  must 
worship  in  spirit  and  truth."  It  should  be 
recognized,  however,  first,  that  Christian- 
ity was  soon  deeply  affected  by  the  sur- 
rounding paganism,  and  that  some  of  these 
pagan  intrusions  have  survived  to  this  day; 
and  secondly,  that  the  Hebrew  religion, 
the  influence  of  which  on  the  Christian 
has  been,  and  is,  very  potent,  was  in  the 
highest  degree  a  racial  religion,  and  its 
Holy  of  Holies  was  local.  In  war-times, 
that  is,  in  times  when  the  brutal  or  savage 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       15 

instincts  remaining  in  humanity  become 
temporarily;  dominant,  and  good-will  is 
limited  to  people  of  the  same  nation,  the 
survival  of  a  tribal  or  national  quality 
in  institutional  Christianity  comes  out 
very  plainly.  The  aid  of  the  Lord  of 
Hosts  is  still  invoked  by  both  parties 
to  international  warfare,  and  each  side 
praises  and  thanks  Him  for  its  successes. 
Indeed,  the  same  spirit  has  often  been  ex- 
hibited in  civil  wars  caused  by  religious 
differences. 

"Now  glory  to  the  Lord  of  Hosts,  from  whom 

all  glories  are ! 

And  glory  to  our  sovereign  liege,  King  Henry 
of  Navarre !" 

It  is  not  many  years  since  an  Archbish- 
op of  Canterbury  caused  thanks  to  be 
given  in  all  Anglican  churches  that  the 


16       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

Lord  of  Hosts  had  been  in  the  English 
camp  over  against  the  Egyptians.  Here- 
tofore the  great  religions  of  the  world 
have  held  out  hopes  of  direct  interventions 
of  the  deity,  or  some  special  deity,  in  favor 
of  his  faithful  worshippers.  It  was  the 
greatest  Jewish  prophets  who  told  King 
Hezekiah  that  the  King  of  Assyria,  who 
had  approached  Jerusalem  with  a  great 
army,  should  not  come  into  the  city  nor 
shoot  an  arrow  there,  and  reported  the 
Lord  as  saying,  "I  will  defend  this  city 
to  save  it,  for  my  own  sake,  and  for  my 
servant  David's  sake."  "And  it  came  to 
pass  that  night,  that  the  angel  of  the  Lord 
went  forth,  and  smote  in  the  camp  of  the 
Assyrians  an  hundred  fourscore  and  five 
thousand;  and  when  men  arose  early  in  the 
morning,  behold,  they  were  all  dead 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       17 

corpses."  The  new  religion  cannot  prom- 
ise that  sort  of  aid  to  either  nations  or 
individuals  in  peril. 

(4s)  In  the  religious  life  of  the  future 
the  primary  object  will  not  be  the  personal 
welfare  or  safety  of  the  individual  in 
this  world  or  any  other.  That  safety,  that 
welfare  or  salvation,  may  be  incidentally 
secured,  but  it  will  not  be  the  prime  ob- 
ject in  view.  The  religious  person  will 
not  think  of  his  own  welfare  or  security, 
but  of  service  to  others,  and  of  contribu- 
tions to  the  common  good.  The  new 
religion  will  not  teach  that  character  is 
likely  to  be  suddenly  changed,  either 
in  this  world  or  in  any  other, — although 
in  any  world  a  sudden  opportunity  for 
improvement  may  present  itself,  and  the 
date  of  that  opportunity  may  be  a  pre- 


18       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

cious  remembrance.  The  new  religion 
will  not  rely  on  either  a  sudden  conversion 
in  this  world  or  a  sudden  paradise  in  the 
next,  from  out  a  sensual,  selfish,  or  dis- 
honest life.  It  will  teach  that  repentance 
wipes  out  nothing  in  the  past,  and  is  only 
the  first  step  towards  reformation,  and  a 
sign  of  a  better  future. 

(5)  The  religion  of  the  future  will  not 
be  propitiatory,  sacrificial,  or  expiatory. 
In  primitive  society  fear  of  the  supernal 
powers,  as  represented  in  the  awful  forces 
of  nature,  was  the  root  of  religion.  These 
dreadful  powers  must  be  propitiated  or 
placated,  and  they  must  be  propitiated  by 
sacrifices  in  the  most  literal  sense ;  and  the 
supposed  offenses  of  man  must  be  expia- 
ted by  sufferings,  which  were  apt  to  be 
vicarious.  Even  the  Hebrews  offered 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       19 

human  sacrifices  for  generations;  and  al- 
ways a  great  part  of  their  religious  rites 
consisted  in  sacrifices  of  animals.  The 
Christian  church  made  a  great  step  for- 
ward when  it  substituted  the  burning 
of  incense  for  the  burning  of  bul- 
locks and  doves;  but  to  this  day  there 
survives  not  only  in  the  doctrines  but  in 
the  practices  of  the  Christian  church  the 
principle  of  expiatory  sacrifice.  It  will 
be  an  immense  advance  if  twentieth-cen- 
tury Christianity  can  be  purified  from  all 
these  survivals  of  barbarous,  or  semi-bar- 
barous religious  conceptions,  because  they 
imply  such  an  unworthy  idea  of  God. 

(6)  The  religion  of  the  future  will  not 
perpetuate  the  Hebrew  anthropomorphic 
representations  of  God,  conceptions  which 
were  carried  in  large  measure  into  insti- 


20       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

tutional  Christianity.  It  will  not  think  of 
God  as  an  enlarged  and  glorified  man, 
who  walks  "in  the  garden  in  the  cool  of 
the  day,"  or  as  a  judge  deciding  between 
human  litigants,  or  as  a  king,  Pharaoh, 
or  emperor,  ruling  arbitrarily  his  subjects, 
or  as  the  patriarch  who,  in  the  early  history 
of  the  race,  ruled  his  family  absolutely. 
These  human  functions  will  cease  to  rep- 
resent adequately  the  attributes  of  God. 
The  nineteenth  century  has  made  all  these 
conceptions  of  deity  look  archaic  and 
crude. 

(7)  The  religion  of  the  future  will  not 
be  gloomy,  ascetic,  or  maledictory.  It 
will  not  deal  chiefly  with  sorrow  and  death, 
but  with  joy  and  life.  It  will  not  care 
so  much  to  account  for  the  evil  and  the 
ugly  in  the  world  as  to  interpret  the  good 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       21 

and  the  beautiful.  It  will  believe  in  no 
malignant  powers — neither  in  Satan  nor 
in  witches,  neither  in  the  evil  eye  nor  in  the 
malign  suggestion.  When  its  disciple  en- 
counters a  wrong  or  evil  in  the  world,  his 
impulse  will  be  to  search  out  its  origin, 
source,  or  cause,  that  he  may  attack  it  at 
its  starting-point.  He  may  not  speculate 
on  the  origin  of  evil  in  general,  but  will 
surely  try  to  discover  the  best  way  to 
eradicate  the  particular  evil  or  wrong  he 
has  recognized. 

Having  thus  considered  what  the  re- 
ligion of  the  future  will  not  be,  let  us  now 
consider  what  its  positive  elements  will  be. 

The  new  thought  of  God  will  be  its  most 
characteristic  element.  This  ideal  will 
comprehend  the  Jewish  Jehovah,  the 


22       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

Christian  Universal  Father,  the  modern 
physicist's  omnipresent  and  exhaustless 
Energy,  and  the  biological  conception  of 
a  Vital  Force.  The  Infinite  Spirit  per- 
vades the  universe,  just  as  the  spirit  of  a 
man  pervades  his  body,  and  acts,  con- 
sciously or  unconsciously,  in  every  atom 
of  it.  The  twentieth  century  will  ac- 
cept literally  and  implicitly  St.  Paul's 
statement,  "In  Him  we  live,  and  move, 
and  have  our  being,"  and  God  is  that 
vital  atmosphere,  or  incessant  inspira- 
tion. The  new  religion  is  therefore 
thoroughly  monotheistic,  its  God  being 
the  one  infinite  force;  but  this  one  God 
is  not  withdrawn  or  removed,  but  indwell- 
ing, and  especially  dwelling  in  every  liv- 
ing creature.  God  is  so  absolutely  im- 
manent in  all  things,  animate  and  in- 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       23 

animate,  that  no  mediation  is  needed 
between  him  and  the  least  particle  of  his 
creation.  In  his  moral  attributes,  he  is 
for  every  man  the  multiplication  to  infinity 
of  all  the  noblest,  tenderest,  and  most  po- 
tent qualities  which  that  man  has  ever  seen 
or  imagined  in  a  human  being.  In  this 
sense  every  man  makes  his  own  picture  of 
God.  Every  age,  barbarous  or  civilized, 
happy  or  unhappy,  improving  or  degener- 
ating, frames  its  own  conception  of  God 
within  the  limits  of  its  own  experiences 
and  imaginings.  In  this  sense,  too,  a  hu- 
mane religion  has  to  wait  for  a  humane 
generation.  The  central  thought  of  the 
new  religion  will  therefore  be  a  humane 
and  worthy  idea  of  God,  thoroughly  con- 
sistent with  the  nineteenth-century  revela- 
tions concerning  man  and  nature,  and  with 


24       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

all  the  tenderest  and  loveliest  teachings 
which  have  come  down  to  us  from  the  past. 
The  scientific  doctrine  of  one  omnipres- 
ent, eternal  Energy,  informing  and  in- 
spiring the  whole  creation  at  every  instant 
of  time  and  throughout  the  infinite  spaces, 
is  fundamentally  and  completely  incon- 
sistent with  the  dualistic  conception  which 
sets  spirit  over  against  matter,  good  over 
against  evil,  man's  wickedness  against 
God's  righteousness,  and  Satan  against 
Christ.  The  doctrine  of  God's  immanence 
is  also  inconsistent  with  the  conception  that 
he  once  set  the  universe  a-going,  and  then 
withdrew,  leaving  the  universe  to  be  op- 
erated under  physical  laws,  which  were 
his  vicegerents  or  substitutes.  If  God  is 
thoroughly  immanent  in  the  entire  crea- 
tion, there  can  be  no  "secondary  causes," 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE      25 

in  either  the  material  or  the  spiritual  uni- 
verse. The  new  religion  rejects  abso- 
lutely the  conception  that  man  is  an  alien 
in  the  world,  or  that  God  is  alienated  from 
the  world.  It  rejects  also  the  entire  con- 
ception of  a  man  as  a  fallen  being,  hope- 
lessly wicked,  and  tending  downward  by 
nature;  and  it  makes  this  emphatic  re- 
jection of  long-accepted  beliefs  because 
it  finds  them  all  inconsistent  with  a  hu- 
mane, civilized,  or  worthy  idea  of  God. 

If,  now,  man  discovers  God  through 
self -consciousness,  or,  in  other  words,  if 
it  is  the  human  soul  through  which  God 
is  revealed,  the  race  has  come  to  the  knowl- 
edge of  God  through  knowledge  of  itself; 
and  the  best  knowledge  of  God  comes 
through  knowledge  of  the  best  of  the  race. 
Men  have  always  attributed  to  man  a 


26       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

spirit  distinct  from  his  body,  though  im- 
manent in  it.  No  one  of  us  is  willing  to 
identify  himself  with  his  body ;  but  on  the 
contrary  everyone  now  believes,  and  all 
men  have  believed,  that  there  is  in  a  man 
an  animating,  ruling,  characteristic  es- 
sence, or  spirit,  which  is  himself.  This 
spirit,  dull  or  bright,  petty  or  grand,  pure 
or  foul,  looks  out  of  the  eyes,  sounds  in 
the  voice,  and  appears  in  the  bearing  and 
manners  of  each  individual.  It  is  some- 
thing just  as  real  as  the  body,  and  more 
characteristic.  To  every  influential  per- 
son it  gives  far  the  greater  part  of  his 
power.  It  is  what  we  call  the  personality. 
This  spirit,  or  soul,  is  the  most  effective 
part  of  every  human  being,  and  is  recog- 
nized as  such,  and  always  has  been.  It 
can  use  a  fine  body  more  effectively  than  it 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       27 

can  a  poor  body,  but  it  can  do  wonders 
through  an  inadequate  body.  In  the  crisis 
of  a  losing  battle,  it  is  a  human  soul  that 
rallies  the  flying  troops.  It  looks  out  of 
flashing  eyes,  and  speaks  in  ringing  tones, 
but  its  appeal  is  to  other  souls,  and  not  to 
other  bodies.  In  the  midst  of  terrible  nat- 
ural catastrophies, — earthquakes,  storms, 
conflagrations,  volcanic  eruptions, — when 
men's  best  works  are  being  destroyed  and 
thousands  of  lives  are  ceasing  suddenly 
and  horribly,  it  is  not  a  few  especially 
good  human  bodies  which  steady  the  sur- 
vivors, maintain  order,  and  organize  the 
forces  of  rescue  and  relief.  It  is  a  few 
superior  souls.  The  leading  men  and 
women  in  any  society,  savage  or  civilized, 
are  the  strongest  personalities, — the  per- 
sonality being  primarily  spiritual,  and  only 


28       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

secondarily  bodily.  Recognizing  to  the 
full  these  simple  and  obvious  facts,  the 
future  religion  will  pay  homage  to  all 
righteous  and  loving  persons  who  in  the 
past  have  exemplified,  and  made  intelligi- 
ble to  their  contemporaries,  intrinsic  good- 
ness and  effluent  good-will.  It  will  be 
an  all-saints  religion.  It  will  treasure  up 
all  tales  of  human  excellence  and  virtue. 
It  will  reverence  the  discoverers,  teachers, 
martyrs,  and  apostles  of  liberty,  purity 
and  righteousness.  It  will  respect  and 
honor  all  strong  and  lovely  human  beings, 
— seeing  in  them  in  finite  measure  quali- 
ties similar  to  those  which  they  adore  in 
God.  Recognizing  in  every  great  and 
lovely  human  person  an  individual  will- 
power which  is  the  essence  of  the  person- 
ality, it  will  naturally  and  inevitably 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       29 

attribute  to  God  a  similar  individual  will- 
power, the  essence  of  his  infinite  personal- 
ity. In  this  simple  and  natural  faith 
there  will  be  no  place  for  metaphysical 
complexities  or  magical  rites,  much  less 
for  obscure  dogmas,  the  result  of  com- 
promises in  turbulent  conventions.  It  is 
anthropomorphic ;  but  what  else  can  a  hu- 
man view  of  God's  personality  be?  The 
finite  can  study  and  describe  the  infinite 
only  through  analogy,  parallelism,  and 
simile ;  but  that  is  a  good  way.  The  new 
religion  will  animate  and  guide  ordinary 
men  and  women  who  are  putting  into  prac- 
tice religious  conceptions  which  result  di- 
rectly from  their  own  observation  and  pre- 
cious experience  of  tenderness,  sympathy, 
trust,  and  solemn  joy.  It  will  be  most 
welcome  to  the  men  and  women  who  cher- 


30       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

ish  and  exhibit  incessant,  all-comprehend- 
ing good-will.  These  are  the  "good" 
people.  These  are  the  only  genuinely  civ- 
ilized persons. 

To  the  wretched,  sick,  and  downtrodden 
of  the  earth,  religion  has  in  the  past  held 
out  hopes  of  future  compensation.  When 
precious  ties  of  affection  have  been  broken, 
religion  has  held  out  prospects  of  imme- 
diate and  eternal  blessings  for  the  de- 
parted; and  has  promised  happy  reunions 

-%•=* 

in  another  and  a  better  world.  To  a  hu- 
man soul,  lodged  in  an  imperfect,  feeble, 
or  suffering  body,  some  of  the  older  re- 
ligions have  held  out  the  expectation  of 
deliverance  by  death,  and  of  entrance 
upon  a  rich,  competent  and  happy  life, — 
in  short,  for  present  human  ills,  however 
crushing,  the  widely  accepted  religions 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE      31 

have  offered  either  a  second  life,  presum- 
ably immortal,  under  the  happiest  condi- 
tions, or  at  least  peace,  rest,  and  a  happy 
oblivion.  Can  the  future  religion  promise 
that  sort  of  compensation  for  the  ills  of 
this  world,  any  more  than  it  can  promise 
miraculous  aid  against  threatened  disas- 
ter? A  candid  reply  to  this  inquiry  in- 
volves the  statement  that  in  the  future 
religion  there  will  be  nothing  "supernat- 
ural." This  does  not  mean  that  life  will 
be  stripped  of  mystery  or  wonder,  or  that 
the  range  of  natural  law  has  been  finally 
determined;  but  that  religion,  like  all  else, 
must  conform  to  natural  law  so  far  as 
the  range  of  law  has  been  determined. 
In  this  sense  the  religion  of  the  future  will 
be  a  natural  religion.  In  all  its  theory  and 
all  its  practice  it  will  be  completely  nat- 


32       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

ural.  It  will  place  no  reliance  on  any  sort 
of  magic,  or  miracle,  or  other  violation  of, 
or  exception  to,  the  laws  of  nature.  It 
will  perform  no  magical  rites,  use  no  oc- 
cult processes,  count  on  no  abnormal  inter- 
ventions of  supernal  powers,  and  admit 
no  possession  of  supernatural  gifts,  wheth- 
er transmitted  or  conferred,  by  any  tribe, 
class,  or  family  of  men.  Its  sacraments 
will  be,  not  invasions  of  law  by  miracle, 

but  the  visible  signs  of  a  natural  spiritual 

i 
grace,  or  of  a  natural  hallowed  custom. 

It  may  preserve  historical  rites  and  cere- 
monies, which,  in  times  past,  have  rep- 
resented the  expectation  of  magical  or 
miraculous  effects;  but  it  will  be  content 
with  natural  interpretations  of  such  rites 
and  ceremonies.  Its  priests  will  be  men 
especially  interested  in  religious  thought, 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE      33 

possessing  unusual  gifts  of  speech  on  de- 
votional subjects,  and  trained  in  the  best 
methods  of  improving  the  social  and  in- 
dustrial conditions  of  human  life.  There 
will  always  be  need  of  such  public  teachers 
and  spiritual  leaders,  heralds,  and  proph- 
ets. It  should  be  observed,  however,  that 
many  happenings  and  processes  which 
were  formerly  regarded  as  supernatural 
have,  with  the  increase  of  knowledge,  come 

to   be   regarded   as   completely  natural. 

i 

The  line  between  the  supposed  natural  and 

the  supposed  supernatural  is,  therefore, 
not  fixed  but  changeable. 

It  is  obvious,  therefore,  that  the  com- 
f 
pletely    natural    quality    of    the    future 

religion  excludes  from  it  many  of  the  re- 
ligious compensations  and  consolations  of 
the  past.  Twentieth-century  soldiers,  go- 


34       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

ing  into  battle,  will  not  be  able  to  say  to 
each  other,  as  Moslem  soldiers  did  in  the 
tenth  century,  "If  we  are  killed  to-day, 
we  shall  meet  again  to-night  in  Paradise." 
Even  now,  the  mother  who  loses  her  babe, 
or  the  husband  his  wife,  by  a  preventable 
disease,  is  seldom  able  to  say  simply,  "It 
is  the  will  of  God!  The  babe— or  the 
woman — is  better  off  in  heaven  than  on 
earth.  I  resign  this  dear  object  of  love 
and  devotion,  who  has  gone  to  a  happier 
world."  The  ordinary  consolations  of  in- 
stitutional Christianity  no  longer  satisfy 
intelligent  people  whose  lives  are  broken 
by  the  sickness  or  premature  death  of 
those  they  love.  The  new  religion  will  not 
attempt  to  reconcile  men  and  women  to 
present  ills  by  promises  of  future  blessed- 
ness, either  for  themselves  or  for  others. 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE      35 

Such  promises  have  done  infinite  mischief 
in  the  world,  by  inducing  men  to  be  pa- 
tient under  sufferings  or  deprivations 
against  which  they  should  have  incessantly 
struggled.  The  advent  of  a  just  freedom 
for  the  mass  of  mankind  has  been  delayed 
for  centuries  by  just  this  effect  of  com- 
pensatory promises  issued  by  churches. 

The  religion  of  the  future  will  approach 
the  whole  subject  of  evil  from  another 
side,  that  of  resistance  and  prevention. 
The  Breton  sailor,  who  had  had  his  arm 
poisoned  by  a  dirty  fish-hook  which  had 
entered  his  finger,  made  a  votive  offering 
at  the  shrine  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  and 
prayed  for  a  cure.  The  workman  to-day, 
who  gets  cut  or  bruised  by  a  rough  or 
dirty  instrument,  goes  to  a  surgeon,  who 
applies  an  antiseptic  dressing  to  the 


36       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

wound,  and  prevents  the  poisoning.  That  * 
surgeon  is  one  of  the  ministers  of  the  new 
religion.  When  dwellers  in  a  slum  suffer 
the  familiar  evils  caused  by  overcrowding, 
impure  food,  and  cheerless  labor,  the  mod- 
ern true  believers  contend  against  the 
sources  of  such  misery  by  providing  pub- 
lic baths,  playgrounds,  wider  and  cleaner 
streets,  better  dwellings,  and  more  effect- 
ive schools, — that  is,  they  attack  the 
sources  of  physical  and  moral  evil.  The 
new  religion  cannot  supply  the  old  sort 
of  consolation ;  but  it  can  diminish  the  need 
of  consolation,  or  reduce  the  number  of 
occasions  for  consolation. 

A  further  change  in  religious  thinking 
has  already  occurred  on  the  subject  of 
human  pain.  Pain  was  generally  re- 
garded as  a  punishment  for  sin,  or  as  a 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       37 

means  of  moral  training,  or  as  an  expia- 
tion, vicarious  or  direct.  Twentieth-cen- 
tury religion,  gradually  perfected  in  this 
respect,  during  the  last  half  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  regards  human  pain  as  an 
evil  to  be  relieved  and  prevented  by  the 
promptest  means  possible,  and  by  any  sort 
of  available  means,  physical,  mental,  or 
moral ;  and,  thanks  to  the  progress  of  bio- 
logical and  chemical  science,  there  is  com- 
paratively little  physical  pain  nowadays 
which  cannot  be  prevented  or  relieved. 
The  invention  of  anaesthetics  has  brought 
into  contempt  the  expiatory,  or  penal, 
view  of  human  pain  in  this  world.  The 
younger  generations  listen  with  incredu- 
lous smiles  to  the  objection  made  only  a 
little  more  than  sixty  years  ago  by  some 
divines  of  the  Scottish  Presbyterian  church 


38       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

to  the  employment  of  chloroform  in  child- 
birth, namely,  that  the  physicians  were 
interfering  with  the  execution  of  a  curse 
pronounced  by  the  Almighty.  Dr.  Weir 
Mitchell,  a  physician  who  has  seen  much 
of  mental  pain  as  well  as  of  bodily,  in 
his  poem  read  at  the  fiftieth  anniversary 
of  the  first  public  demonstration  of  sur- 
gical anaesthesia,  said  of  pain  :• 

"What  purpose  hath  it?     Nay,  thy  quest  is 

vain: 

Earth  hath  no  answer:  If  the  baffled  brain 
Cries,  'Tis  to  warn,  to  punish,  Ah,  refrain! 
When  writhes  the  child,  beneath  the  surgeon's 

hand, 

What  soul  shall  hope  that  pain  to  under- 
stand? 

Lo !     Science  falters  o'er  the  hopeless  task, 
And  Love  and  Faith  in  vain  an  answer  ask." 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       39 

A  similar  change  is  occurring  in  regard 
to  the  conception  of  divine  justice.  The 
evils  in  this  world  have  been  regarded  as 
penalties  inflicted  by  a  just  God  on  human 
beings  who  had  violated  his  laws ;  and  the 
justice  of  God  played  a  great  part  in  his 
imagined  dealings  with  the  human  race. 
A  young  graduate  of  Andover  Theolog- 
ical Seminary  once  told  me  that  when  he 
had  preached  two  or  three  times  in  sum- 
mer in  a  small  Congregational  church  on 
Cape  Cod,  one  of  the  deacons  of  the 
church  said  to  him  at  the  close  of  the 
service,  "What  sort  of  sentimental  mush 
is  this  that  they  are  teaching  you  at  An- 
dover? You  talk  every  Sunday  about 
the  love  of  God ;  we  want  to  hear  about  his 
justice."  The  future  religion  will  not 
undertake  to  describe,  or  even  imagine, 


40       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

the  justice  of  God.  We  are  to-day  so 
profoundly  dissatisfied  with  human  jus- 
tice, although  it  is  the  result  of  centuries 
of  experience  of  social  good  and  ill  in  this 
world,  that  we  may  well  distrust  human 
capacity  to  conceive  of  the  justice  of  a 
morally  perfect,  infinite  being.  The  civ- 
ilized nations  now  recognize  the  fact  that 
legal  punishments  usually  fail  of  their  ob- 
jects, or  cause  wrongs  and  evils  greater 
than  those  for  which  the  punishments  were 
inflicted;  so  that  penology,  or  the  science 
of  penalties,  has  still  to  be  created.  It  is 
only  very  lately  that  the  most  civilized 
communities  began  to  learn  how  to  deal 
with  criminal  tendencies  in  the  young. 
In  the  eyes  of  God  human  beings  must 
all  seem  very  young.  Since  our  ideas  of 
God's  modes  of  thinking  and  acting  are 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       41 

necessarily  based  on  the  best  human  at- 
tainments in  similar  directions,  the  new 
religion  cannot  pretend  to  understand 
God's  justice,  inasmuch  as  there  is  no 
human  experience  of  public  justice  fit  to 
serve  as  the  foundation  for  a  true  con- 
ception of  God's.  The  new  religion  will 
magnify  and  laud  God's  love  and  com- 
passion, and  will  not  venture  to  state 
what  the  justice  of  God  may,  or  may  not, 
require  of  himself,  or  of  any  of  his 
finite  creatures.  This  will  be  one  of  the 
great  differences  between  the  future  re- 
ligion and  the  past.  Institutional  Chris- 
tianity as  a  rule  condemned  the  mass  of 
mankind  to  eternal  torment;  partly  be- 
cause the  leaders  of  the  churches  thought 
they  understood  completely  the  justice  of 
God,  and  partly  because  the  exclusive 


42       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

possession  of  means  of  deliverance  gave 
the  churches  some  restraining  influence 
over  even  the  boldest  sinners,  and  much 
over  the  timid.  The  new  religion  will 
make  no  such  pretensions,  and  will  teach 
no  such  horrible  and  perverse  doctrines. 

Do  you  ask  what  consolation  for  human 
ills  the  new  religion  will  offer?  I  an- 
swer, the  consolation  which  often  comes 
to  the  sufferer  from  being  more  service- 
able to  others  than  he  was  before  the  loss 
or  the  suffering  for  which  consolation  is 
needed;  the  consolation  of  being  one's  self 
wiser  and  tenderer  than  before,  and  there- 
fore more  able  to  be  serviceable  to  human 
kind  in  the  best  ways;  the  consolation 
through  the  memory,  which  preserves  the 
sweet  fragrance  of  characters  and  lives  no 
longer  in  presence,  recalls  the  joys  and 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       43 

achievements  of  those  lives  while  still 
within  mortal  view,  and  treasures  up  and 
multiplies  the  good  influences  they  ex- 
erted. Moreover,  such  a  religion  has  no 
tendency  to  diminish  the  force  in  this 
world,  or  any  other,  of  the  best  human  im- 
aginings concerning  the  nature  of  the  in- 
finite Spirit  immanent  in  the  universe.  It 
urges  its  disciples  to  believe  that  as  the 
best  and  happiest  man  is  he  who  best  loves 
and  serves,  so  the  soul  of  the  universe 
finds  its  perfect  bliss  and  efficiency  in  su- 
preme and  universal  love  and  service.  It 
sees  evidence  in  the  moral  history  of  the 
human  race  that  a  loving  God  rules  the 
universe.  Trust  in  this  supreme  rule  is 
genuine  consolation  and  support  under 
many  human  trials  and  sufferings.  Nev- 
ertheless, although  brave  and  patient 


44       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

endurance  of  evil  is  always  admirable,  and 
generally  happier  than  timid  or  impatient 
conduct  under  suffering  or  wrong,  it  must 
be  admitted  that  endurance  or  constancy 
is  not  consolation,  and  that  there  are  many 
physical  and  mental  disabilities  and  in- 
juries for  which  there  is  no  consolation 
in  a  literal  sense.  Human  skill  may  miti- 
gate or  palliate  some  of  them,  human 
sympathy  and  kindness  may  make  them 
more  bearable,  but  neither  religion  nor 
philosophy  offers  any  complete  consola- 
tion for  them,  or  ever  has. 

In  thus  describing  the  consolations  for 
human  woes  and  evils  which  such  a  reli- 
gion can  offer,  its  chief  motives  have  been 
depicted.  They  are  just  those  which 
Jesus  said  summed  up  all  the  command- 
ments, love  toward  God  and  brotherliness 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       45 

to  man.  It  will  teach  a  universal  good- 
will, under  the  influence  of  which  men  will 
do  their  duty,  and,  at  the  same  time, 
promote  their  own  happiness.  The  devo- 
tees of  a  religion  of  service  will  always  be 
asking  what  they  can  contribute  to  the 
common  good;  but  their  greatest  service 
must  always  be  to  increase  the  stock  of 
good-will  among  men.  One  of  the  worst 
chronic  human  evils  is  working  for  daily 
bread  without  any  interest  in  the  work, 
and  with  ill-will  towards  the  institution  or 
person  that  provides  the  work.  The  work 
of  the  world  must  be  done ;  and  the  great 
question  is,  shall  it  be  done  happily  or 
unhappily?  Much  of  it  is  to-day  done 
unhappily.  The  new  religion  will  con- 
tribute powerfully  toward  the  reduction 
of  this  mass  of  unnecessary  misery,  and 


46       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

will  do  so  chiefly  by  promoting  good-will 
among  men. 

A  paganized  Hebrew-Christianity  has 
unquestionably  made  much  of  personal 
sacrifice  as  a  religious  duty.  The  new  re- 
ligion will  greatly  qualify  the  supposed 
duty  of  sacrifice,  and  will  regard  all  sac- 
rifices as  unnecessary  and  injurious,  ex- 
cept those  which  love  dictates  and  justifies. 
"  Greater  love  hath  no  man  than  this,  that 
a  man  lay  down  his  life  for  his  friends." 
Self-sacrifice  is  not  a  good  or  a  merit  in 
itself;  it  must  be  intelligent  and  loving 
to  be  meritorious,  and  the  object  in  view 
must  be  worth  its  price.  Giving  up  at- 
tractive pleasures  or  labors  in  favor  of 
some  higher  satisfaction,  or  some  engross- 
ing work,  is  not  self-sacrifice.  It  is  a 
renunciation  of  inferior  or  irrelevant  ob- 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       47 

jects  in  favor  of  one  superior  object;  it 
is  only  the  intelligent  inhibition  of  what- 
ever distracts  from  the  main  pursuit,  or 
the  worthiest  task.  Here,  again,  the 
new  religion  will  teach  that  happiness 
goes  with  dutifulness  even  in  this 
world. 

All  the  religions  have  been,  to  a  greater 
or  less  extent,  uplifting  and  inspiring,  in 
the  sense  that  they  raised  men's  thoughts 
to  some  power  above  them,  to  some  being 
or  beings,  which  had  more  power  and 
more  duration  than  the  worshippers  had. 
When  kings  or  emperors  were  deified, 
they  were  idealized,  and  so  lifted  men's 
thoughts  out  of  the  daily  round  of  their 
ordinary  lives.  As  the  objects  of  wor- 
ship became  nobler,  purer,  and  kinder 
with  the  progress  of  civilization,  the  pre- 


48       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

vailing  religion  became  more  stimulating 
to  magnanimity  and  righteousness.  Will 
the  future  religion  be  as  helpful  to  the 
spirit  of  man?  Will  it  touch  his  imag- 
ination as  the  anthropomorphism  of  Juda- 
ism, polytheism,  Islam,  and  paganized 
Christianity  have  done?  Can  it  be  as 
moving  to  the  human  soul  as  the  deified 
powers  of  nature,  the  various  gods  and 
goddesses  that  inhabited  sky,  ocean, 
mountains,  groves,  and  streams,  or  the 
numerous  deities  revered  in  the  various 
Christian  communions, — God  the  Father, 
the  Son  of  God,  the  Mother  of  God,  the 
Holy  Ghost,  and  the  host  of  tutelary 
saints?  All  these  objects  of  worship  have 
greatly  moved  the  human  soul,  and  have 
inspired  men  to  thoughts  and  deeds  of 
beauty,  love,  and  duty.  Will  the  new 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       49 

religion  do  as  much?  •  It  is  reasonable  to 
expect  that  it  will.  The  sentiments  of 
awe  and  reverence,  and  the  love  of  beauty 
and  goodness,  will  remain,  and  will  in- 
crease in  strength  and  influence.  All  the 
natural  human  affections  will  remain  in 
full  force.  The  new  religion  will  foster 
powerfully  a  virtue  which  is  compara- 
tively new  in  the  world — the  love  of  truth 
and  the  passion  for  seeking  it,  and  the 
truth  will  progressively  make  men  free; 
so  that  the  coming  generations  will  be 
freer,  and  therefore  more  productive  and 
stronger  than  the  preceding.  The  new 
religionists  will  not  worship  their  ances- 
tors; but  they  will  have  a  stronger  sense 
of  the  descent  of  the  present  from  the 
past  than  men  have  ever  had  before,  and 
each  generation  will  feel  more  strongly 


50       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

than  ever  before  its  indebtedness  to  the 
preceding. 

The  two  sentiments  which  most  inspire 
men  to  good  deeds  are  love  and  hope. 
Religion  should  give  freer  and  more  ra- 
tional play  to  these  two  sentiments  than 
the  world  has  heretofore  witnessed;  and 
the  love  and  hope  will  be  thoroughly 
grounded  in  and  on  efficient,  serviceable, 
visible,  actual,  and  concrete  deeds  and 
conduct.  When  a  man  works  out  a  suc- 
cessful treatment  for  cerebro-spinal  men- 
ingitis— a  disease  before  which  medicine 
was  absolutely  helpless  a  dozen  years  ago 
— by  applying  to  the  discovery  of  a  rem- 
edy ideas  and  processes  invented  or  de- 
veloped by  other  men  studying  other 
diseases,  he  does  a  great  work  of  love, 
prevents  for  the  future  the  breaking  of 


RELIGION  Of  THE  FUTUHE      51 

innumerable  ties  of  love,  and  establishes 
good  grounds  for  hope  of  many  like  ben- 
efits for  human  generations  to  come. 
The  men  who  do  such  things  in  the  present 
world  are  ministers  of  the  religion  of  the 
future.  The  future  religion  will  prove, 
has  proved,  as  effective  as  any  of  the 
older  ones  in  inspiring  men  to  love  and 
serve  their  fellow-beings, — and  that  is  the 
true  object  and  end  of  all  philosophies  and 
all  religions;  for  that  is  the  way  to  make 
men  better  and  happier,  alike  the  servants 
and  the  served. 

The  future  religion  will  have  the  attri- 
bute of  universality  and  of  adaptability 
to  the  rapidly  increasing  stores  of  knowl- 
edge and  power  over  nature  acquired  by 
the  human  race.  As  the  religion  of  a 
child  is  inevitably  very  different  from  that 


52       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

of  an  adult,  and  must  grow  up  with  the 
child,  so  the  religion  of  a  race  whose  ca- 
pacities are  rapidly  enlarging  must  be 
capable  of  a  corresponding  development. 
The  religion  of  any  single  individual 
ought  to  grow  up  with  him  all  the  way 
from  infancy  to  age ;  and  the  same  is  true 
of  the  religion  of  a  race.  It  is  bad  for 
any  people  to  stand  still  in  their  govern- 
mental conceptions  and  practices,  or  in 
the  organization  of  their  industries,  or  in 

any  of  their  arts  or  trades,  even  the  oldest ; 

i 

but  it  is  much  worse  for  a  people  to  stand 

i 

still   in   their   religious   conceptions   and 

practices.  Now,  the  new  religion  affords 
an  indefinite  scope,  or  range,  for  progress 
and  development.  It  rejects  all  the  lim- 
itations of  family,  tribal,  or  national  reli- 
gion. It  is  not  bound  to  any  dogma, 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       53 

creed,  book,  or  institution.  It  has  the 
whole  world  for  the  field  of  the  loving 
labors  of  its  disciples ;  and  its  fundamental 
precept  of  serviceableness  admits  an  in- 
finite variety  and  range  in  both  time  and 
space.  It  is  very  simple,  and  therefore 
possesses  an  important  element  of  dura- 
bility. It  is  the  complicated  things  that 
get  out  of  order.  Its  symbols  will  not 
relate  to  sacrifice  or  dogma;  but  it  will 
doubtless  have  symbols,  which  will  repre- 
sent its  love  of  liberty,  truth,  and  beauty. 
It  will  also  have  social  rites  and  reverent 
observances ;  for  it  will  wish  to  commemo- 
rate the  good  thoughts  and  deeds  which 
have  come  down  from  former  generations. 
It  will  have  its  saints;  but  its  canoniza- 
tions will  be  based  on  grounds  somewhat 
new.  It  will  have  its  heroes;  but  they 


54       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

must  have  shown  a  loving,  disinterested, 
or  protective  courage.  It  will  have  its 
communions,  with  the  Great  Spirit,  with 
the  spirits  of  the  departed,  and  with  living 
fellow-men  of  like  minds.  Working  to- 
gether will  be  one  of  its  fundamental 
ideas, — of  men  with  God,  of  men  with 
prophets,  leaders,  and  teachers,  of  men 
with  one  another,  of  men's  intelligence 
with  the  forces  of  nature.  It  will  teach 
only  such  uses  of  authority  as  are  neces- 
sary to  secure  the  cooperation  of  several 
or  many  people  to  one  end;  and  the  disci- 
pline it  will  advocate  will  be  training  in 
the  development  of  cooperative  good-will. 
Will  such  a  religion  as  this  make  prog- 
ress in  the  twentieth-century  world? 
You  have  heard  in  this  Summer  School 
of  Theology  much  about  the  conflict  be- 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       55 

tween  materialism  and  religious  idealism, 
the  revolt  against  long-accepted  dogmas, 
the  frequent  occurrence  of  waves  of  re- 
form, sweeping  through  and  sometimes 
over  the  churches,  the  effect  of  modern 
philosophy,  ethical  theories,  social  hopes, 
and  democratic  principles  on  the  estab- 
lished churches,  and  the  abandonment  of 
churches  altogether  by  a  large  proportion 
of  the  population  in  countries  mainly 
Protestant.  You  know,  too,  how  other 
social  organizations  have,  in  some  consider- 
able measure,  taken  the  place  of  churches. 
Millions  of  Americans  find  in  Masonic  or- 
ganizations, lodges  of  Odd  Fellows,  be- 
nevolent and  fraternal  societies,  granges, 
and  trades-unions,  at  once  their  practical 
religion,  and  the  satisfaction  of  their  social 
needs.  So  far  as  these  multifarious  or- 


56       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

ganizations  carry  men  and  women  out  of 
their  individual  selves,  and  teach  them 
mutual  regard  and  social  and  industrial 
cooperation,  they  approach  the  field  and 
functions  of  the  religion  of  the  future. 
The  Spiritualists,  Christian  Scientists, 
and  mental  healers  of  all  sorts  manifest  a 
good  deal  of  ability  to  draw  people  away 
from  the  traditional  churches,  and  to  dis- 
credit traditional  dogmas  and  formal 
creeds.  Nevertheless,  the  great  mass  of 
the  people  remain  attached  to  the  tradi- 
tional churches,  and  are  likely  to  remain 
so, — partly  because  of  their  tender  asso- 
ciations with  churches  in  the  grave  crises 
of  life,  and  partly  because  their  actual 
mental  condition  still  permits  them  to 
accept  the  beliefs  they  have  inherited  or 
been  taught  while  young.  The  new  re- 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       57 

ligion  will  therefore  make  but  slow  prog- 
ress, so  far  as  outward  organization  goes. 
It  will,  however,  progressively  modify 
the  creeds  and  religious  practices  of  all 
the  existing  churches,  and  change  their 
symbolism  and  their  teachings  concerning 
the  conduct  of  life.  Since  its  chief  doc- 
trine is  the  doctrine  of  a  sublime  unity 
of  substance,  force,  and  spirit,  and  its 
chief  precept  is,  Be  serviceable,  it  will  ex- 
ert a  strong  uniting  influence  among  men. 
Christian  unity  has  always  been  longed 
for  by  devout  believers,  but  has  been 
sought  in  impossible  ways.  Authorita- 
tive churches  have  tried  to  force  every- 
body within  their  range  to  hold  the  same 
opinions  and  unite  in  the  same  observ- 
ances, but  they  have  won  only  temporary 
and  local  successes.  As  freedom  has  in- 


58       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

creased  in  the  world,  it  has  become  more 
and  more  difficult  to  enforce  even  outward 
conformity ;  and  in  countries  where  church 
and  state  have  been  separated,  a  great 
diversity  of  religious  opinions  and  prac- 
tices has  been  expressed  in  different 
religious  organizations,  each  of  which 
commands  the  effective  devotion  of  a  frac- 
tion of  the  population.  Since  it  is  certain 
that  men  are  steadily  gaining  more  and 
more  freedom  in  thought,  speech,  and 
action,  civilized  society  might  as  well  as- 
sume that  it  will  be  quite  impossible 
to  unite  all  religiously-minded  people 
through  any  dogma,  creed,  ceremony,  ob- 
servance, or  ritual.  All  these  are  divisive, 
not  uniting,  wherever  a  reasonable  free- 
dom exists.  The  new  religion  proposes  as 
a  basis  of  unity,  first,  its  doctrine  of  an 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE      59 

immanent  and  loving  God,  and  secondly, 
its  precept,  Be  serviceable  to  fellow-men. 
Already  there  are  many  signs  in  the  free 
countries  of  the  world  that  different  re- 
ligious denominations  can  unite  in  good 
work  to  promote  human  welfare.  The 
support  of  hospitals,  dispensaries,  and 
asylums  by  persons  connected  with  all 
sorts  of  religious  denominations,  the  union 
of  all  denominations  in  carrying  on 
Associated  Charities  in  large  cities,  the 
success  of  the  Young  Men's  Christian 
Associations,  and  the  numerous  efforts  to 
form  federations  of  kindred  churches  for 
practical  purposes,  all  testify  to  the  feasi- 
bility of  extensive  cooperation  in  good 
works.  Again,  the  new  religion  cannot 
create  any  caste,  ecclesiastical  class,  or 
exclusive  sect  founded  on  a  rite.  On 


60       RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE 

these  grounds  it  is  not  unreasonable  to 
imagine  that  the  new  religion  will  prove 
a  unifying  influence,  and  a  strong  rein- 
forcement of  democracy. 

Whether  it  will  prove  as  efficient  to 
deter  men  from  doing  wrong  and  to  en- 
courage them  to  do  right  as  the  prevailing 
religions  have  been,  is  a  question  which 
only  experience  can  answer.  In  these 
two  respects  neither  the  threats  nor  the 
promises  of  the  older  religions  have  been 
remarkably  successful  in  society  at  large. 
The  fear  of  hell  has  not  proved  effective 
to  deter  men  from  wrong-doing,  and 
heaven  has  never  yet  been  described  in 
terms  very  attractive  to  the  average  man 
or  woman.  Both  are  indeed  unimagin- 
able. The  great  geniuses,  like  Dante  and 
Swedenborg,  have  produced  only  fan- 


RELIGION  OF  THE  FUTURE       61 

tastic  and  incredible  pictures  of  either 
state.  The  modern  man  would  hardly 
feel  any  appreciable  loss  of  motive-power 
toward  good  or  away  from  evil  if  heaven 
were  burnt  and  hell  quenched.  The  pre- 
vailing Christian  conceptions  of  heaven 
and  hell  have  hardly  any  more  influence 
with  educated  people  in  these  days  than 
Olympus  and  Hades  have.  The  modern 
mind  craves  an  immediate  motive  or  lead- 
ing, good  for  to-day  on  this  earth.  The 
new  religion  builds  on  the  actual  experi- 
ence of  men  and  women,  and  of  human 
society  as  a  whole.  The  motive  powers 
it  relies  on  have  been,  and  are,  at  work  in 
innumerable  human  lives;  and  its  beatific 
visions  and  its  hopes  are  better  grounded 
than  those  of  traditional  religion,  and 
finer, — because  free  from  all  selfishness, 


62 

and  from  the  imagery  of  governments, 
courts,  social  distinctions,  and  war. 

Finally,  this  twentieth-century  religion 
is  not  only  to  be  in  harmony  with  the  great 
secular  movements  of  modern  society — 
democracy,  individualism,  social  idealism, 
the  zeal  for  education,  the  spirit  of  re- 
search, the  modern  tendency  to  welcome 
the  new,  the  fresh  powers  of  preventive 
medicine,  and  the  recent  advances  in  busi- 
ness and  industrial  ethics — but  also  in 
essential  agreement  with  the  direct,  per- 
sonal teachings  of  Jesus,  as  they  are  re- 
ported in  the  Gospels.  The  revelation 

he  gave  to  mankind  thus  becomes  more 

i 

wonderful  than  ever. 


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